Challenge of the Youth Bulge in Africa and the Middle East

The Challenge of Youth Bulge in Africa and the Middle East NSD-S HUB & PCNS Joint Project

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MIGRATION The objective of this section is to review population data and highlight the geographical distribution of age groups in Africa and Middle East. The push and pull factors, in particular those relating to an individual’s motivation to migrate, will then be thoroughly investigated.

Migration and the brain drain are not evenly distributed throughout the regions of Africa and the Middle East. This is intrinsically connected to the population growths being caused by the youth bulge. While Eastern, Middle and Western Africa account for more than half of all the under- 35s, Northern Africa and Middle East host more than half of the over-65s. This imbalance implies that the migration and the brain drain are concentrated mostly in Western, Middle and Eastern Africa. Interestingly, Eastern, Middle and Western Africa have approximately

75% of the new-born children. While this suggests that the youth bulge is a fairly recent phenomenon, it also highlights that within the next two decades the challenges generated by the bulge, such as migration and the brain drain, are going to become increasingly more impelling, especially when considering the push and pull migratory factors on the ground.

Push and Pull Factors

The Push-Pull theory (Lee E., 1966) lays out the sociological ground for understanding an individual’s motivation to migrate. It explains international migration on the basis of the differences between the levels of development between origin and destination countries. The latter usually have a set of attractive living conditions for immigrants who leave their origin countries because of less pleasant standards. Lee’s analytical framework bases the decision to migrate on four key factors: area of origin; area of destination; intervening obstacles; and personal factors. This paper will only tackle the first of these, in particular the push factors in the countries of origin of highly skilled migrants from Africa and Middle East, and how it feeds the phenomenon commonly known as “the brain drain”.